When a senator or representative secures federal funds for a particular project back home, that money is set aside, or earmarked, for that purpose. Locally, think of Springfield’s federal courthouse, the entire State Street corridor. No one walking by the gleaming new courthouse would think of earmarks as evil.

But here’s what happens: Money gets set aside for a project that can be held up for public scorn - a study of bat guano and attic air quality in the Western Dakota mountains, say - and the whole process is painted with the broadest, ugliest brush.

To be sure, there’s some waste. But weighing the good against the foolishness would demonstrate undeniably the real merits of earmarks.

Still, even without that kind of analysis, there’s a grand hole in the arguments of the anti-earmarking crowd: An outright ban would have only a minuscule effect on the budget. In the fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30, earmarks represented a mere 1 percent of discretionary spending, the part of the federal budget that Congress controls.

In other words, if earmarks were eliminated, truly important projects in cities and towns across the land would likely go wanting, Congress would be deprived of one of its fundamental constitutional roles - and the budget would still be out of control.

Banning earmarks to benefit the federal budget would be like trying to get your household finances in order by focusing on the cost of the water you use when you wash your hands before dinner.